UnSaid: fireworks, a porcelain soldier and a stitched mandarin
Fireworks in the swamp, a porcelain soldier and a stitched mandarin — the international exhibition UnSaid presents in Zurich statements on censorship and self-censorship, silence as a tool of power and a way of life. What is remarkable and unique about the student project? «Switzerland for all» tells the story.
UnSaid took about six months to take on its essence and form. On the threshold of summer seven curators, students of the Zurich University of the Arts (Zürcher Hochschule der Künste), staged together in one space a well-focused puzzle of fifty works by eighteen artists and art groups from a dozen of countries. A lot of artists live in exile, some participate anonymously.
— Different voices, stories and perspectives intersect in this group exhibition to reinforce each other. It’s always a balance of carefully thought out agreements, — shares one of the curators, Maria Sorensen. — We are happy that the forbidden and suppressed has managed to express itself and to have among our participants such an important project as Dispatches that the Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp (M HKA) organized last year for the Kyiv Biennale.
Events of the fifth Kyiv Biennale took place last fall and at the beginning of this year throughout Europe: in Kyiv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Uzhgorod, Berlin, Warsaw, Lublin, Antwerp and Vienna. 12 postcards from 12 world-famous artists were shared at all venues of the Kyiv Biennale and now Zurich has taken the baton of solidarity with Ukraine through Dispatches.
While totalitarian regimes try to dismember and destroy, art resists war and state control over all aspects of public and private life of people, and strives to unite forces to preserve freedom and a fair world. The works presented on UnSaid from different continents work in the same direction.
The exhibition in Zurich plays with various sign systems, languages, «tools of communication», and touches various senses. UnSaid is at the very least worth watching, reading, listening to and pondering about. The palette of materials is wide. Photography, canvas, porcelain, embroidery, audio, video and even live fruits of an evergreen citrus tree.
The Housing Maintenance Service or ZhES in Belarus monitors the condition of houses. The artist Maksim Shved also does it from the point of view of ZhES art — social art. By destroying «forbidden» political graffiti images on the walls of buildings and fences, housing and communal services employees introduce their own “creativity” into the appearance of the city landscape, making the ban on free expression visible. One of the photographs shows the facade of the Okrestina (Окрестина) prison in Minsk.
The unsaid is expressed through sounds, colors, silhouettes, lines and spots or the absence of such. Sergei Prokofiev’s series of 30 images was created by burning objects made of graphite plastic: «The deserter is a figure of absence. This is the one who left, betrayed, is subject to punishment and oblivion. And this is the one who survived, and also the one who did not kill others». Another work of this artist demilitarises and frees fireworks from serving a totalitarian state.
Swiss artists Stefan Baltensperger and David Siepert have been working together since 2007. Baltensperger + Siepert think critically and make visible and manipulate social, cultural and political systemic issues. In the coordinates of art, the ideal soldier-killing machine turns into a “universal porcelain soldier”, instructions are written for refugees from their former homeland, the philosophy of the invisible and other implicit phenomena of the predictable uncertainty of war and peace are explored.
Here is a book of poems and a diary of the Belarusian protest by Julia Cimafiejeva translated into English — «Motherfield: Poems & Belarusian Protest Diary» plus the author’s own audio recording of the poem «Цела поэткi» in Belarusian:
Body of a Poetess
A poet’s body belongs to his motherland.
Motherland speaks through the poet’s mouth.
Poet’s eyes see how unfairly it suffers.
Poet’s ears hear the agony of the innocent.
Poet’s hair stands on end ,
poet’s legs burst into oaks poet’s hands fold into fists.
Motherland! Can you speak for yourself without poet’s help?
And would you like my body, the body of a poetess?
My blood is as hot
I got hands, legs, seeing eyes, hearing ears,
my mouth is no smaller than any poet’s.
You don’t wish to respond, motherland.
You turn away.
Perhaps we are too much alike.
You’d rather be weak, don’t you, motherland?
You want the poet to speak for you
to pity you
to wipe your tears
to sing praises to your suffering and your world famous resilience?
Even now you are not listening.
Tsk-tsk: you are whining to your poet.
No, motherland, you don’t need a body of a poetess.
It’s mine.
(Translated from Belarusian by Valzhyna Mort and Hanif Abdurraqib)
Another wave of silencing the feminine in the female body is visible through the embroidery of Frances Melhop. Special edition of the Swiss newspaper «20 Minuten» with the 12th President of Turkey Recep Erdogan in every image by Serhat Ertuna. Hidden words of the Russian translation of Roberto Carnero’s book «Pasolini” by the Russian publishing house AST. A Mandarin fruit (almost a billion people speak Mandarin) by Ying Xi, adorned with the Chinese character meaning both «making whole» and «shut up». Plus other revelations about censorship and self-censorship, silence as a tool of power and a way of life at the UnSaid exhibition.
See UNSaid in Zurich
The UnSaid exhibition can be seen in Zurich until 15 June 2024 at Töpferstrasse 26, 8045 Zürich
Curators: Maria Sorensen, Lara Sutter, Lynn Guo, Zahira Mozafari, Frances Melhop, Evgeniia Kostinskaia, Mary Lilith Fischer
Artists: Dispatches from Kyiv Biennale 2023, Maksim Shved, Gleb Choutov, Zhanna Gladko, Julia Cimafiejeva, Sergei Prokofiev, Pomidor Art Collective, Simona Ripkauskaite, Serhat Ertuna, Baltensperger + Siepert, Katayoun Karami, Deorditsa K, Lynn Guo, Meng Zhang, Ying Xu, Frances Melhop, Linda Paoli, Gianni Bandinelli
Countries: Belgium-Kiev Biennale 2023, Belarus, Lithuania, Turkey, Switzerland, Iran, China, New Zealand (USA), Italy and others
Catalog of the international exhibition UnSaid in pdf format (6.2 MB)
Maria Sorensen did the translation.
- Украинцы под защитой. На Швейцарию надейся, а сам не плошай - 27 июня 2024
- Плен – это ад. Украина добивается возвращения своих граждан - 20 июня 2024
- UnSaid: fireworks, a porcelain soldier and a stitched mandarin - 14 июня 2024
Marina Okhrimovskaya
Publicist and poetess, co-founder and editor of the magazine «Switzerland for all» / schwingen.net
Images:
Maria Sorensen, one of the seven curators of the international exhibition UnSaid. Zurich, 31 May – 14 June 2024 (© Photo Thierry Bröhm)
The international exhibition UnSaid presented in Zurich statements about censorship and self-censorship, silence as a tool of power and a way of life. May 31 – June 14, 2024 (© Thierry Bröhm)
Zahira Mozafari, she is one of the seven curators of the international exhibition UnSaid. Zurich, 31 May – 14 June 2024 (© Thierry Bröhm)
Additionally:
Julia Cimafijeva. Motherfield: Poems & Belarusian Protest Diary (English Edition)
Поделитесь публикацией с друзьями